The present invention relates to an internal combustion engine and particularly, to an opposed piston engine with unique drive means for coupling the pistons to a power utilization device.
With the current interest in energy savings through increased fuel economy and reducing air pollution largely caused by exhaust gases from internal combustion engines employed in motor vehicles, several attempts are being made to increase the efficiency of the standard internal combustion engine as well as reduce its pollution. Such attempts include, for example, the addition of pollution control equipment to the engine, the control of fuel to the engine, or the addition of additives to increase mileage. Such added equipment in some cases reduces gas mileage in order to reduce pollution or increases fuel economy at the expense of increasing pollution. With the exception of the Wankel engine, there are no known recent efforts to redesign the basic structure of an internal combustion engine to achieve the goals of lower air pollution and increased fuel efficiency.
The prior art includes a variety of engine designs including opposed piston engines such as represented by U.S. Pat. Nos. 1,719,537 issued to C. Dulche on July 2, 1929; 2,383,648 issued to F. C. Hawkins on Aug. 28, 1945; and more recently, U.S. Pat. No. 3,258,992 issued to J. L. Hittell on July 5, 1966. The prior art structure, however, does not suggest construction capable of relatively high power output and high speed operation required of today's motor vehicle engines nor efficient engines capable of good fuel economy and low pollution. Nor do such engines suggest the unique construction utilized by the engine of the present invention.